Odette: Will you love me, Derek, until the day I die? Derek: No. Much longer, Odette. Much longer.

Ex-Disney animation director Richard Rich made this animated feature in 1994, which adapts the plot (though not the music) of the ballet Swan Lake.

Odette and Derek are betrothed royalty of neighboring kingdoms, though it isn't until they're grown that they actually fall in love. Too bad that first, Derek doesn't know what he loves about her besides her beauty, which upsets her, and second, the evil Rothbart — banished from her kingdom years ago for practicing the "Forbidden Arts" — kidnaps her.

When she refuses to marry Rothbart and make him king, he curses her to become a swan during daylight hours and moonless nights. The remorseful Derek seeks and finds her, but with Rothbart staying one step ahead of the lovers — and One-Winged Angel, too — invoking the Curse Escape Clause is not easy, even with Talking Animal friends helping them out.

While no blockbuster, it did spawn sequels: The Swan Princess II: Escape from Castle Mountain (1997), The Swan Princess: The Mystery of the Enchanted Kingdom (1998), The Swan Princess Christmas (2012), and The Swan Princess: A Royal Family Tale (2014). The first pits them against Rothbart's old partner Clavius, the second against his consort Zelda, the third against a resurrected Rothbart, and the fourth against The Forbidden Arts themselves.

This film (and its sequels) contain examples of:

Almost Dead Guy: King William's captain in the first film. After the king's carriage is attacked and Odette taken prisoner, he manages to stumble all the way back to Derek's kingdom and lives just long enough to tell Derek they were attacked by "a great animal."

King William himself follows suit when Derek finds him at the scene of the attack, hanging on just long enough to give a cryptic warning that said great animal is "not what it seems". Rothbart gave us two Almost Dead Guys for the price of one! Not bad.

Amusing Injuries: The animals, fairly often - after they steal the map from the tower, for example. The human characters generally don't get these, with the notable exception of one point in the opening montage where you have the main characters - including Odette - as kids getting involved in a goofy and haphazard accident and cutting away to the group of them in the traditional amusingly exaggerated slings and bandages.

Arrow Catch: Derek's skill at this proves vital in the climax when he runs out of his own arrows and Bromley shoots one over to him. The fact that the two had actually practiced this move, and apparently did so every day, makes it a lot easier to swallow.

Taken Up to Eleven in the second film, where Derek walks into a trap and has several crossbow bolts launched at him, but catches them all in one motion. All that "Practice, Practice, Practice" must've paid off.

Artifact Title: In the third film, Derek and Odette are absent for most of the movie, as it puts more focus on the Queen and Rogers' love life. And Odette is only turned into a swan for about forty-five seconds before it's undone, and it's completely unexplained why she was made a swan again. By A Royal Family Tale, Odette doesn't transform at all.

Rothbart's Villain Song implies that he wants to do this - he turns people into an ostrich, lizard, pig, and an ape during the song.

Bat Scare: Puffin encounters a swarm of bats in the first film - and ends up losing his feathers in the process.

Beauty Equals Goodness: Oddly, given that part of the film's moral is "Looks aren't all that matters", the bad guys are ugly and the good guys pretty (though the hag does a Heel-Face Turn at the end which extends to the sequels, thus proving the moral right).

Odette's initial rejection of Derek's idea to get married was because he was doing it just because she was beautiful and couldn't think of anything else he liked about her. It's not that her beauty was the problem, but Derek's shallowness.

Canon Discontinuity: Possibly the first two sequels, as the CGI ones either simply gloss them over, or pretend they never happened.

The Cast Showoff: Howard McGillin (Derek) is just about the only cast member to do all of his own singing, being a respected Broadway alumni.

Catchphrase: Puffin as "No fear!" which even gets it's own song, which itself has reprises through the series. He most often says it to Jean Bob, who constantly lampshades it throughout the second movie.

"Do you know how much that phrase makes me want to hit you?"

Cheaters Never Prosper: In the first movie Bromley tries cheating twice, first while playing chess with Derek, then during the training session with the band, and he still loses both times.

Chekhov's Skill: "Catch and Fire", in which Bromley shoots an arrow at Derek's back and Derek turns around, catches the arrow, and fires it at a different target.

Childhood Friend Romance: As part of their arranged marriage, Derek and Odette spent every summer together from the time they were young children, right up until adulthood. They start off somewhat roughly, due to being, well, kids, and thus not having any real desire to form a romantic attraction, but they do become closer (though begrudgingly so) over time.

Puffin, too. He's of particular help to Odette since he's able to accompany her more conveniently than their non-flying friends.

Convection Schmonvection: In the second film, the villain's lair is in a volcano, with a moat of boiling lava surrounding it. The only way to cross the moat is in a small wooden box pulled along by a rope and pulley system-all parts of which should easily have been incinerated within moments of exposure to the heat rising off the lava. Also, at the end there is a great deal of frothing, exploding lava being tossed about-sometimes within millimeters of the heroes, and filling up the space directly below them completely-and none of them get even slightly scorched.

Covers Always Lie: Ever so slightly. The DVD cover◊ seems to have a much different character design for Derek, mostly making his hair look more manly.

The DVD cover for the second movie has King William standing near Queen Uberta, despite the fact Rothbart killed King William in the first movie.

Curse Escape Clause: If Derek can make a vow of love to Odette and prove it to the world, that will be enough to break the curse. Rothbart is sharp enough to build a condition into the first half of this: Odette will die if the vow is subsequently made to another woman...fulfilling the second half can still save the day, but it turns out to require killing Rothbart, aka the Great Animal.

Damsel in Distress: Odette. Notably, while she does require saving, she had previously done everything she could to try and liberate herself or at least get Derek's attention to help free her. While she does need Derek to save her, it's somewhat justified since Rothbart's spell can only be broken either by him or be Derek making a vow of everlasting love to the whole world, so Derek is an integral part in breaking the spell. Odette even basically says if she could break the spell by herself she would.

Also notable is that Odette actively tries to seek out Derek, including breaking into Rothbart's castle to steal a map and then flying to Derek's hunting grounds to find him.

Deadpan Snarker: Rogers delivers most of the best lines in the movies as this.

Rogers: You should write a book: How to Offend Women in 5 Syllables or Less.

Jean-Bob is also a prime example.

Jean-Bob: Mad? Why should I be mad? I enjoy hanging on for dear life! Next to snorkeling, it's one of my favorite activities!

Don't forget Speed, who has fewer lines but is voiced by Steven Wright in the first film.

Didn't Think This Through: Jean-Bob fails to think of how he's going to return to shore after retrieving the flowers for Odette. Lampshaded by Speed.

Speed: Just curious, how are you going to get back?

Disappeared Dad: It is mentioned in the prologue that Uberta was a widow, so Derek's dad is assumed to be dead. The original ballet even has her character as a Queen Mum sort of figure, only ruling as Sovereign Princess until her son is able to take a wife.

Disney Death: Odette in the first film, Jean-Bob in the second, and Odette again in the third.

Duck!: Done during the song "Practice, Practice, Practice" when Derek launches (harmless) arrows at a group of servants acting as targets. Cue the musician dressed as a duck popping his head up to say "Yes?" and then getting hit.

Easily Forgiven: Odette initially calls off the marriage on account of Derek's incredible shallowness, but this issue is quickly tossed aside. His dedication to finding her after everyone believed her dead could have served to overcome this, but she's still singing about their "unshakable bond" without ever realizing he's even looking.

Epic Fail: When Odette confronts Derek about what else he likes about her other than her beauty, his response is a bewildered "What else is there?". Thorougly lampshaded by Rogers later, who tells him he should write a book on "how to insult a woman with five syllables or less."

Bromley fails spectacularly at helping Derek cheat at poker.

Everyone Can See It: By the time they're teenagers, Bromley is teasing Derek about his feelings for Odette, and the entire village around the castle is singing about how they can't wait for the wedding.

Falling in Love Montage: In the third movie, while Derek is singing "Because I Love Her", it shows clips from the first movie. Though for some reason they chose some decidedly unromantic clips for this love song, such as Odette dying, and Derek hunting down and murdering the Big Bad in an action sequence.

Faux Affably Evil: Rothbart may be a sadistic Jerkass, but man, does he have style! He never loses his temper (fully) either.

Specifically, the choreography for "No More Mr. Nice Guy" is... suspiciously similar to Aladdin's "Friend Like Me".

The scene near the end where Derek rides his horse and uses his sword to cut through trees to reach Odette is pretty reminiscent of Sleeping Beauty.

Foreshadowing: With a very heady hand. Young Derek gives baby Odette a locket with a swan on it, and when they grow into young adults, he compares her to The Ugly Duckling who "somehow suddenly became a swan." Later in the movie, she's cursed to become a swan each time the moon sets.

Freudian Excuse: In the sequel Uberta tries to get Clavius to talk about how he was raised and if his parents neglected him. Clavius just wants her to shut up.

Happily Married: Derek and Odette, at the very end of the first film and in the sequels.

Heel-Face Turn: Bridget, Rothbart's hag sidekick at the end of the first movie. Apparently the Chamberlain had something to do with it.

Hoist by His Own Petard: In the third movie, when Odette tries to escape, Zelda responds by turning Odette into a swan and trapping her inside a magical barrier that will vaporize anything that touches it. Later, Zelda is destroyed when she is thrown at said barrier.

Hypercompetent Sidekick: Rothbart's sidekick Bridget is a subversion. She spends most of the film either dealing with the animals or wordlessly supporting Rothbart's decisions, but, when he turns her into an exact copy of Odette (save for a black and red dress) her acting is perfect.

Idiot Ball: Rothbart; rather than do anything to brainwash Odette to do his bidding, he instead opts to curse her to transform into a swan until she professes her true love for him. He later ends up doing away with his own claim on the throne by cursing Odette to die should Derek profess his love to the wrong princess. Also, despite his own transformation abilities, he apparently never thinks to just disguise himself as King William or just marry a fake Odette.

Derek frequently gets handed this; between his completely inept answer to Odette's question of his love for her, hunting random wild animals without any discernible means by which to identify them as the Great Animal, or his failure to burn the notes to the Forbidden Arts in the third film for no other reason than he wanted to wait until after a festival, it's a wonder how Derek manages an entire kingdom sometimes.

Indecisive Deconstruction: the film did deconstructs Disney Princess movies early on, such as the princess of the film points out that to a prince that she arranged to get married doesn't have much reason to love her aside just her beauty, but then brushed aside and they both get married in the end of the film, despite not having really much relationship building throughout the film, and also they really didn't like each other at all during their childhood and adolescent, where the characters were actually animated quite interestingly with the princess having a spunky proactive personality, but then becomes a boring typical princess character later in the film.

Well, except in the second movie, since Puffin can't fly due to an injury he suffered early in the movie, Odette asks to be turned into a swan so she can fly to where Derek is and save him from being killed by a guy working for the Big Bad.

I Owe You My Life: After she takes the arrow out of his wing, Lt. Puffin vows service to Odette.

It Only Works Once: Firing an arrow into Rothbart's heart killed him in the first movie, but in the Christmas Special, when Rothbart assumes his One-Winged Angel form again, not even throwing a knife could kill him.

My God, What Have I Done?: Derek practically breathes this trope, having at least one such moment in the first three movies; 1) When he is tricked into professing his love to the wrong woman by Rothbart and thus triggering Odette's untimely death, 2) When he fails to be there for his mother before she is kidnapped by Clavius in the second movie, and 3) When Zelda steals the notes to the Forbidden Arts after Derek fails to destroy them promptly, a mistake that again leads to Odette's death at Zelda's hands later.

Mythology Gag: At least one of the sequels refers to the lake outside Derek's and Odette's castle (originally Rothbart's) as Swan Lake.

Never Say "Die": It's implied everyone believes Odette was killed, but they only ever refer to her as being "gone" or "not coming back". And poor King William, who did die, is never mentioned again. Averted with Rothbart, who flat out says Odette will die if Derek makes the vow of everlasting love to someone else.

Never Trust a Trailer: the trailer of Swan Princess 3 shows Rogers falling from a spatial height towards the Earth, implying that something of epic proportion will happen. Sadly, it's just a part of a Disney Acid Sequence.

One trailer for the original movie states that Odette is kidnapped "right before (her and Derek's) wedding", when in the movie their engagement is cancelled.

No Flow in CGI: Averted and played straight in the CGI sequels - Bridget, Bromley, and background characters all have flat rubbery hairstyles that are short or kept tied up, but Odette has individually animated strands of hair, and Roger, Euberta, Derek, and Rothbart have hair that's flat but bounces and shifts.

No Name Given: Rothbart's hag sidekick in the first movie. In the sequels her name is revealed to be Bridget.

Obviously Evil: You'd think that Derek would notice Bridget's disguise, considering he's known Odette his whole life to dress in white, whereas Bridget is wearing an Obviously Evil red/black outfit.

In the first film, Derek's mouth gets progressively larger and larger. If you're paying attention, he starts to look... odd.

In the third one, Odette is constantly switching back and forth between wearing a white and green tight dress, a white and green puffy sleeved dress, and a blue palette swap of the latter, all within the same scenes.

One-Winged Angel: Rothbart's "final boss fight" form is hyped throughout the first film, so for some viewers, it's final reveal was a bit of a Narm moment. He kind of resembles a very large fruitbat.

Overused Running Gag: Puffin's overuse of the phrase, "No Fear!" during the first two movies constantly annoys Jean-Bob, until he finally threatens to tear Puffin's beak off if he says it again.

Parental Abandonment: Odette's mother and Derek's father initially; the former's father dies after Rothbart attacks the carriage to kidnap her.

Princesses Rule: In the first movie, Uberta mentions that she intends for Derek to become king as soon as he takes a wife, and Derek calls Odette his "future queen." In the sequels, however, Derek and Odette are still referred to as a prince and princess even after they're married and Derek has taken over running the kingdom completely.

If you want to see her alive again, COMMA!, then meet me at the mouth of the western river with the missing section of Rothbart's notes!

EXCLAMATION! EXCLAMATION! EXCLAMATION!"

Quicksand Sucks: In the second movie, while Derek is swinging over a deep pit in a swamp, The Dragon cuts the vine and Derek falls in. The Dragon then just sits and watches as Derek pleads for his life, all the while being swallowed alive by the bog. Fortunately for him, Odette (now in swan form for the time being) shows up and pulls him out just before he can go completely under.

Remember the New Guy: In the original film, Rothbart was working alone. The sequels retconned this by introducing Clavius and Zelda as old partners of his.

Satellite Love Interest: Near the beginning of the first movie, Derek calls for wedding arrangements upon seeing how beautiful Odette has become. Odette promptly breaks off their engagement thinking that Derek only wants to marry her because of her beauty. In his own words "Well, what else is there?" He gets better after this.

Shout-Out: During Rothbart's Villain Song, he is shown doing one-handed pushups. Rothbart is voiced by Jack Palance, who a few years earlier won the Academy Award for City Slickers, and as a humorous Take That at those who would think he had only won as a consolation for losing his previous two nominations, demonstrated his fitness at the age of 73 by dropping to the floor to do a series of one-handed pushups.

Smart People Play Chess: Somewhat subverted in that the only two we seeing playing are Derek and Bromley, the former, while not stupid, is not the sharpest sword in the armory, and the latter loses while cheating.

Species Surname: Lieutenant Puffin. The almost-certainly-not-canon-but-still-extant bonus features on the most recent DVD claim that his parents were so proud of being puffins. they simply named him "Puffin".

Stating the Simple Solution: Rothbart has enough power to simply take King William's kingdom for himself, and Odette flat out tells him this. His argument is that "Once you steal something, you spend your whole life fighting to keep it."

Every closeup of Derek and Odette kissing looks exactly the same, except for some changes in the background and/or costumes. This doubles as an Every Episode Ending.

Odette often changes from a swan into a human through stock footage.

Suspect Is Hatless: Describing the thing that killed everybody and stole the princess as "a great animal" is not much help, guys. At least King William provides some help ("it's not what it seems", which Derek manages to deduce meant a shape-shifter), but it still leaves Derek with no clue of where to start looking, and as such almost accidentally kills Odette.

Talking Animal: Puffin, Speedy and Jean Bob (and technically Odette), though the series is rather inconsistent with this. In the first movie, the three of them can talk to Odette even when she's human, other humans apparently can't understand them nor Odette when she is in swan form. In the second and third movies, however, the animals can all talk freely to anyone.

This Was Her True Form: Even though Odette doesn't land in the lake after Derek's vow to Bridget starts killing her, she still turns human to share "final" words with Derek.

Training Montage: "Practice, Practice, Practice" is a musical number built around this.

Transformation Sequence: Odette's back-and-forth transformations, where the water gracefully swirls around her, obscuring her actual change.

Upgrade Artifact: The magic orb that has power of granting perfect mastery of all three disciplines of mystic arts - Creation, Change and Destruction.

Villain Song: "No More Mr. Nice Guy" in the first film, "Ya Gotta Love It" in the second, and "Nothing but Bad Days Ahead" in the third.

Women Are Wiser: Zigzagged. When Derek and Odette meet again as young adults, they're equally smitten with each other despite all their time complaining about how immature and annoying the other used to be. When Derek announces he plans to marry Odette and gives no reason besides her beauty, she calls the marriage off because she wasn't going to marry someone who named good lucks as the only attractive thing about her. However, Derek then reveals in a later scene that he loved her before he noticed she was beautiful, but didn't know how to express that, and goes to great lengths to prove how he feels. Then in the sequels, Derek is repeatedly portrayed as wrong to the point where the theme of the third could be summed up as "listen to your wife, because she's always right."

Workaholic: The second movie shows Derek so busy with his royal duties that he and Odette don't have much time for romantic activities, not even on their first anniversary.

Writers Cannot Do Math: In Secret of the Castle, Uberta is said to be 50, but she looked exactly the same at the start of the first film where she would have been around 30.

Yank the Dog's Chain: A blast from the Forbidden Arts in the second movie turns Jean-Bob into a human prince, but another blast turns him back into a frog. No one he tells this to later believes him.

Youthful Freckles: In an unusually literal example, Odette had freckles◊, for just one summer while she was a tomboy. Once she grew into a more elegant, feminine woman the freckles were gone again.

Yo Yo Plot Point: Every film has Odette turned into a swan somehow at some point.

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